1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a sterilizing and rinsing water generating method and an apparatus therefor for sterilizing and rinsing human bodies such as hands and the like, foods and various kinds of equipment, clothing, environmental facilities and the like to which germs are liable to be deposited in hospitals, kitchens and the like.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, there is used an alkali aqueous solution in which sodium hypochlorous acid is dissolved in a prescribed concentration is used as sterilizing and rinsing water for sterilizing and rinsing human bodies such as hands and the like, foods and various kinds of equipment, clothing and environmental facilities such as passages to which germs are liable to be deposited in hospitals, kitchens and the like.
Since the alkali aqueous solution of sodium hypochlorous acid does not have a sufficient sterilizing capability in alkalinity, however, it must be acidified at any time. Thus, the alkali aqueous solution of sodium hypochlorous acid is not only troublesome in handling but also it does not have a sufficient sterilizing capability even if it is acidified.
To cope with the above problem, there is recently used a method of generating sterilizing and rinsing water by adding sodium chloride and inorganic acid to water and creating hypochlorous acid by electrolyzing the resulting water solution.
Although the sterilizing and rinsing water in which the hypochlorous acid is created has a sterilizing capability higher than that of the conventional sterilizing and rinsing water using sodium hypochlorous acid, a problem arises in that the sterilizing and rinsing water does not have a sufficient sterilizing capability to resistant germs such as MRSA, Helicobacter pylori, hepatitis B viruses, etc., which have turned into problems recently, and requires a long sterilizing time.
To cope with the above problem, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 3-502068 proposes a method of creating hypobromous acid which has a sterilizing capability higher than that of hypochlorous acid as a method of obtaining a higher sterilizing capability.
The hypobromous acid creating method proposed by Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 3-502068 can provide the sterilizing capability higher than that obtained by the above method of creating hypochlorous acid by means of sodium chloride. However, since germs typically represented by Bacillus subtilis, Clostridium botulinum, Cryptosporidium, etc. that form spores have a very high tolerance, there is desired the development of sterilizing and rinsing water which has a higher sterilizing capability and is effective even to the germs which forms the spores, in view of the recent situation that food poisoning and hospital contamination caused by pathogenic E coli have turned into problems.
An object of the present invention made in view of the above problems is to provide a method of and an apparatus for generating sterilizing and rinsing water having a high sterilizing capability capable of sterilizing even germs which form spores having a high tolerance.